What Pushes Your Buttons? How To Manage Your Insecurity
During my years in elementary school and well into junior high, while the other kids were in gym class or at lunch, I had to go home. I had a neurological problem that made it dangerous for me to be too physically active or get too hot, and so my mom picked me up in the middle of the day to rest....
4 Ways To Create Kindness With Your Partner – Before Your Words Lead To Divorce.
Your reality is created with your words. “I can’t take much more of this.” “I can’t believe I ever married you.” “I’ve had it with you.” These words may be said in jest, or in a heated moment, or perhaps they’re repeated in exasperation....
Why Women And Men Who Are Being Abused Don’t Leave. An Exercise for Understanding.
How did a jingle singer become a therapist? It took me years. I began by volunteering at the Battered Women’s Shelter in Dallas. I was singing jazz at the Fairmont Hotel bar; my night would end at 1:00 in the morning, and the shelter needed someone for the 2:00 – 6:00 am crisis intervention line...
Three Vital Reasons To Say “I’m Sorry” In Your Marriage
“Love means you never have to say you’re sorry.” Those words were emblazoned on a poster of Ali McGraw and Ryan O-Neal, the tragic lovers from the 1970 hit “Love Story,” which my sixteen year-old self had absorbed with teenage belief. I couldn’t wait to get into...
What Is Healthy Dependence In A Relationship?
Have you or someone you know recently said, “We’re so codependent.” A bunch of folks are using the term, but what exactly is it? You sense it’s not a good thing, or something you want. But when did we start talking about? And what does it actually mean? The beginning of...
Five Things To Do When Someone Needs You Too Much
“I don’t know if I would make it if I didn’t have you to talk to.” “Sometimes I just want to it to be over. But I know I have you, and that keeps me from doing anything.” If you hear these words from a friend or someone you care about, they hopefully send a shiver up your spine. That...
Ten Ways To Stay Out Of Texting Trouble
“Text me.” That request would’ve sounded crazy 25 years ago. Now it’s the way many of us communicate. I like to text. It’s easy and fun and it often makes a lot of things more convenient, opening up time in my day to be more productive. Or to binge on a little Netflix. However,...
The Red Bucket Man
Someone reached out to me this week. “Every time I see the red bucket man, I think of you, and put a little money in the bucket.” That warmed my heart. One of the great gifts that blogging has brought me is the many people I’ve learned from and communicated with here locally in...
How To Avoid A Long Hauliday
People can dread the holiday season for a number of both simple and complicated reasons. If it’s loss.. You might have had losses or trials in your life that overwhelm any attempts to celebrate; you remember past holiday seasons with tears in your eyes. You’re not sure how you’re...
Finding Meaning In Friendships That End
I remember the first Christmas break after my freshman year in college. My high school friends and I had just seen each other at Thanksgiving. Everything had been fantastic — lots of reminiscing as well as catching up, laughing about someone sporting a new beard or talk about who was still...
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